Winters Electrical Services
Electrical
What did you use before Countfire? What did you dislike about it?
We did takeoffs manually. Where do I start? Manual takeoffs take too long, symbols are too easy to miss and even when you've counted everything, a revised pricing schedule or addendum is all that's required to make you start all over again. To say we disliked it is putting it lightly!
Why did you decide to bring Countfire to your business?
Results. For some time we had been on the lookout for an automated takeoff solution that actually worked and initially brought Countfire into our business on a trial basis. After using the software on a number of estimates, it was obvious how much time we would save by implementing it permanently. Ryan Beck comments that:
"Each tender now takes significantly less time to complete."
What were the top two challenges you had before Countfire?
- Working too many unsociable hours and having to decline too many tenders. Estimating workloads can be very unpredictable and we were too often faced with the choice of expanding our working hours to deal with tenders, or worse, declining to price them and missing out on the opportunity altogether.
- We didn't have a good process for the handover of projects between estimating and the quantity surveying team.
How did Countfire help you overcome them?
- Countfire has made us much more efficient. Each tender now takes significantly less time to complete and the output quantity report and quantity breakdown system also makes general tender or pricing document addendums much easier to deal with and less time consuming.
- All information relating to the takeoff is now digital making the handover and conversion of a tender from estimating to the quantity surveying team is much cleaner. The quantity surveyor is now able to easily compare tender and construction issue drawings, and has access to exactly how our takeoffs were produced and quantified which in turn saves them time, and increases their productivity.
"We can make a few selections with Countfire and symbols are automatically counted across an entire building. It's a huge time saver."
What are the top two Countfire features for you and how do you use them?
- Automated counting - This is a no-brainer. We can make a few selections with Countfire and symbols are automatically counted across an entire building. It's a huge time saver.
- Marked up drawings - Countfire provides us with marked up drawings showing exactly what we've counted and what areas those counts are broken down into. These drawings are clean, clear and ideal to present to a client from a professional point of view. As a result, our tender presentations are much cleaner and more professional as we don't have a set of drawings with hand written notations all over them, and our clients can use them as a detail of exactly what items have been included for.
What's the return on investment of Countfire for you?
The speed and productivity of our tenders has increased by 30-40% when using Countfire and comparing tender and addendum drawings is now five times as fast when compared to manual working.
The accuracy of our takeoffs now peaks up to 100% when using the system, which when coupled with the speed increases, is quite remarkable.
Trial Countfire today to see how automated estimating can improve your businesses’ speed and accuracy, and help you win more work.
